Kansas - Oil & Gas

摘要

Supreme Court Reaffirms When Grant in Fee to Railroad Creates Only an Easement The Kansas Supreme Court, in Jenkins v. Chicago Pacific Corp., 403 P.3d 1213 (Kan. 2017), reaffirms the analysis employed in Abercrombie v. Simmons, 81 P. 208 (Kan. 1905), to determine whether a deed purporting to convey a fee interest in land to a railroad company conveys only an easement. It also reaffirms the policy rationale for the rule as stated in Harvest Queen Mill & Elevator Co. v. Sanders, 370 P.2d 419 (Kan. 1962) (preventing the granting of strips of land in fee to lay railroad tracks). This case comes at an opportune moment because the U.S. Court of Federal Claims and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit have recently failed to apply the Abercrombie rule, thereby allowing uncompensated takings of land from Kansas landowners to support the Rails-to-Trails program under section 8(d) of the National Trails System Act, 16 U.S.C.